


All That You Never Wanted To Know

by morganya



Category: Bandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-09
Updated: 2009-08-09
Packaged: 2017-10-20 08:28:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/210780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morganya/pseuds/morganya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"This photographer, he must have really had it in for you."</p>
            </blockquote>





	All That You Never Wanted To Know

Tom really should blame tour boredom for everything. One of the crew (no one would actually man up and admit it, but Tom has a feeling it was Chad) decided he was going to use his day off to go porn shopping. Tom walked into the front lounge to find everyone going over the selection of DVDs.

"You can already get this stuff for free on the internet," Bill said, contemplating the director's cut of _No Cum Dodging Allowed #4_. "I don't know why you'd want to shell out for this."

Butcher said, "Well, sometimes you just need a quiet movie night, I guess."

Tom picked up _Toss My Salad 4: The Ascension_ from the table; a girl with bleached hair and a tongue piercing stared back at him, like he was distracting her from the faceless guy bent over in front of her, his cheeks spread under her fake nails. Bill peered over his shoulder at the cover, breath soft on the side of his neck.

"This guy here looks like that dude on _7th Heaven_ ," Carden said, shaking the cover. Tom heard the DVD rattle.

"I thought I saw one with that title," Siska said. "Or maybe it was _7th Dicking_."

"Am I going to have to call your mom?" Bill said, smiling.

"Only if you want to tell her how bad you suck as a chaperone," Siska said cheerily.

"Low blow, Adam," Bill said. He put the DVD down with a resigned sigh. "I still don't know what the big deal is."

They still wound up watching one of the DVDs at three in the morning, for lack of anything better to do. Tom sat next to Bill on the couch, sipping at his beer and staring at the TV. He'd forgotten the title — it was something like _Hot Hot Lifeguards_ or whatever.

There was a red haired girl onscreen with a dark haired guy between her legs. She stared back at the camera, mouthing moans while her hands lay flat against the guy's shoulders. She was wearing some sort of eyeliner.

"She's not even into it," Bill said. "Look at that."

"He's not doing that great either," Butcher said. He threw some popcorn kernels into his mouth. "He's going at her like she's cotton candy or something."

"I never ate cotton candy like that," Siska said.

"Well, then you're missing _out_ ," Butcher said, and Siska laughed.

"This whole fuckin' thing looks fake," Carden said.

"It's lit really poorly, too," Bill said. "They look like zombies. Tombo, it looks bad, right?"

"Looks like shit," Tom said. The girl on screen stared into the camera lens, bored and annoyed.

Bill took a drink and leaned back on the couch, arm resting on the back. "This is crap," he said. "I could do better."

"Please don't talk about how you could do porn ever again," Siska said.

"It wouldn't be porn. I'm just saying I could do better."

"Gross," Carden said.

"I could," Bill muttered to himself. Tom sighed loudly, but he still looked over, meeting Bill's eyes.

And he saw the look that said _Maybe_ , and after that he was a goner.

*****

Tom thought that Jon would let him borrow the video camera, but Bill ixnayed the idea once he brought it up. Tom didn't see what the big deal was, he'd borrowed the camera before, but Bill stared at him and said, "I am not going to involve Jonny Walker in this, are you insane?" and Tom gave in.

They had to bide their time for a while, until they got a three day break between San Francisco and Portland. They stopped in a shitty motel outside of Turner; Bill put an arm around his shoulders and just kind of hung there, just in case anyone else thought about asking who was bunking with who.

The carpet in the room was worn threadbare and a weird shade of tan. Bill looked around, swallowed, and said, "I'm going to see if I can get Tony to get some scotch or something, we passed a liquor store on the way."

"Okay," Tom said. Bill threw his bag in the corner and wandered back outside, chewing on his nails.

Tom took the camera out of its bag and stared it, then stared at the room. The light wasn't great, all fake fluorescence, like he was standing in a gym shower. He turned off the lights and raised the camera to his eye. The room got smaller as he stared it down through the lens.

By the time Bill got back, his hands full of rustling plastic bags and clinking glass, he'd almost figured out what he wanted to do. He left one light on by the bed, trying to minimize the fake light, and then he stared at the camera, trying to figure out what shutter speed would work.

"Have a drink first," Bill said. He put the bags down and took out the bottles. "Let's not rush things."

Tom put the camera down and joined him by the table. Bill sloshed red wine into the cheap motel water glasses.

"Cheers," he said. "To new experiences."

It didn't take long to abandon the glasses. Bill stripped the covers off the bed and threw them into the bathroom because he said the pattern was ugly. He sat cross-legged with his shirt off on the white sheets, fingers around the neck of the wine bottle, biting his lip as he stared up at Tom.

"How should we start this?"

"It was your idea, dude," Tom said. "Just go nuts."

"It's set up, right?"

"Yeah, yeah." Tom raised the camera up, Bill's face coming into focus.

"Okay," Bill said. He took a long drink and put the bottle aside.

Tom knew this, knew how long to wait between shots, knew just when to push the shutter, and again. He knew how the flash of the camera reflected off of Bill, his long fingers undoing his belt, pulling lube out of his pocket. Bill took a breath, looking for all the world like he was trying to ignore him, as he undid his zipper (nubby bitten nails looking raw against the denim), sliding out of the jeans.

Tom cleared his throat and took another shot.

At the back of his mind he knew these wouldn't look the way he wanted them to. The light was wrong, he was standing at a weird angle, looking down at Bill on the bed, fingers shiny with lube, touching himself, cock swelling upwards. Bill's eyes were half-shut; in the camera flash he looked like someone's blissful murder victim.

And then Bill turned away, hair falling against his cheekbone, and dropped his hands. His cock went instantly soft and fell against the inside of his thigh. "No, don't, quit it."

"What?" Tom said. Without thinking, he pressed the shutter button again. Bill pushed himself against the headboard, pulling his knees to his chin.

"I don't want to do this anymore."

"What the hell's wrong now?" He sounded harsher than he meant, the director dealing with another temperamental star.

"I can't do it. Not with you standing there."

"You're the one who wanted me to take these," Tom said.

"Yeah, but you're just standing there. Watching me. I can't — goddamnit, put the fucking camera down, Tom."

Tom put the camera down. Bill pushed his hair out of his face.

"I can't. You're just there. Not doing anything. I keep thinking you're going to laugh at me."

"Jesus, Bill," Tom said, because he'd thought he had been doing something, what Bill had wanted.

"I don't want to," Bill said sulkily. "Not with you watching."

"I won't watch," Tom said. "I'll just take the fucking picture."

"Don't make me do this by myself," Bill said.

"Well, what am I supposed to do?"

Bill gave him a pleading look.

"Oh," Tom said.

He grabbed the bottle off the bedside table and swigged down as much as he could stand for liquid courage, then went and rummaged around in his bag until he found the remote trigger. It took a minute to set the camera up, plugging it in and placing it hopefully securely on the dresser in front of the bed. Bill sat and watched him, drinking.

"What?" Tom said when he thought everything was set. The trigger was slick in his sweaty palm, his thumb resting on the button.

Bill tugged him down onto the bed. "Don't move your hands."

Tom lay stretched out, heart pounding, trying to resist the urge to touch Bill's face or stroke his hair. He pressed the button as Bill kissed his forehead and his eyes and the tip of his chin, straddling his hips as he undid Tom's shirt with sticky fingers, the camera flash lighting him up from behind. Tom shut his eyes and did his best not to watch, imagining Bill's face like he was watching a movie, the slow smile, the long fingers against his skin.

Bill didn't bother to take his jeans off all the way, just pulled them down and slid his hand under the waistband of Tom's boxers, pressing hard against Tom's thigh and saying, "Keep going, keep going." His hands were warm and callused and Tom jerked when he came, clumsy fingers on the trigger and pulling the camera off the dresser. Bill burst out laughing and then kissed his face, again and again.

Much later, after everything is all over, Tom goes through the pictures again, even though he doesn't know why. He stares down at his own face in black and white, swollen lips and sweat beads on his temples. He sees the curve of Bill's shoulder, the skinny arms, the messy hair. He sees Bill in fragments, always in and out of frame, like the photographic evidence of a ghost.


End file.
